About Me

Gregg Walker is a Harlem Resident and 1997 graduate of Yale Law School who worked as an investment banker for 9 years and was the Vice President of Strategy and Mergers & Acquisitions at Viacom for 3 years. Gregg served as the Senior Vice President of Corporate Development at Sony from 2009 to 2016, and he launched his own private investing firm in July 2016 (www.gawalker.co). Gregg was chosen in 2010 by Crain's as one of NYC's 40 Under 40 Rising Stars (http://mycrains.crainsnewyork.com/40under40/profiles/2010/gregg-walker). Gregg is a Deacon at Abyssinian Baptist Church and served as the chairman of the Board of the Harlem YMCA. He has served on the Boards of movie studio MGM and music publishing companies Sony/ATV and EMI Music Publishing. He is also a Board member of Harlem RBI and Derek Jeter's Turn 2 Foundation. He is a former Term Member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a representative of the US at the 2002 Young Leaders Conference of the American Council on Germany. Gregg is also a member of many other foundations and community organizations.

Monday, January 10, 2011

NCAA Abuses Defenseless Men of Color

With tonight's end of the college football season, we are reminded that Manhattan is the home of the Heisman Trophy and that the men who seek that trophy are being abused by the collegiate athletic regime currently in place. The NCAA controls nearly aspect of the lives of the college athletes and will not allow those athletes to benefit in any way from the billions of dollars of value they create for others.

Heisman Trophy

The Heisman Trophy is the most prestigious award in college sports. It is provided each year to the most outstanding football player in college football.

The award has always been headquartered in Manhattan. John Heisman was a legendary player, coach, and athletic director in college football. After his incredible career, he retired in New York City. At the Downtown Athletic Club in lower Manhattan, Heisman organized a process to select the most outstanding college football player. The first award was announced in 1935, but Heisman died before the 1936 award presentation. The Downtown Athletic Club named the award after Heisman and hosted the award ceremony until the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks damaged the Dowtown Athletic Club. Other Manhattan locations have hosted the ceremony in the years since 2001, and the Heisman Trophy's connection to Manhattan has been strengthened by the past decade rather than weakened by it.

The NCAA generates more than $700 million each year, primarily from television rights. The schools represented by the NCAA generate additional revenue from merchandise sales and other opportunities. None of that revenue is shared with the athletes that are responsible for the creation of that revenue.

The NCAA's use of the likenesses of student-athletes in video games, on apparel, and on television promotions has caused a lawsuit based on the NCAA's apparent monopoly in the area of collegiate athletics, and the plaintiff is hoping to create momentum for paying student-athletes.

If the NCAA continues to forbid student-athletes from receiving discounted services, they should face additional legal action. The NCAA is, in many ways, the adversary of these young men of color that generate all of the NCAA's revenue. The NCAA has attorneys, accountants, experts, consultants, and every type of professional guidance. The student athlete is not only on his/her own in battling the NCAA, but the NCAA's rules would both forbid the athlete for paying for guidance by selling assets and prevent the athlete from accepting guidance at no charge from a non-profit. They have twisted the concept of amateurism to mean that the NCAA has unlimited power to abuse the young people that create the NCAA's revenue and that those young people are violating rules by preparing the defend themselves against the NCAA.

These young people need an organization to defend them against the NCAA monopoly, and the NCAA must recognize the rights of these young people to accept guidance from professionals seeking to level the playing field.